Obviously, this captured people’s attention and as always golf is a game of total contradiction.

On one hand, Dicks Sporting Goods just fired all their PGA pros to cut cost on a declining golf business they acquired. As well, Taylormade/Addidas, a major advertiser in every issue of GolfDigest is lamenting the lack of growth, creating a Hack Golf initiative and suggesting things like a pizza pie cup. On the other, attacking golfers who are struggling to recover their game sends a pretty opposite message. Especially when one of the major barrier to golf for beginners is the intimidating factor of looking bad in front of better players.

Most of us are familiar with Sir Charles’ struggles in golf. As a bogey golfer, I have great respect and admiration for those of us who:

Struggle from getting it to getting worse from one day to the next;

Continue to challenge the game despite being embarrassed by their peers or by the game itself from time to time;

Have the fortitude and grit to dust themselves off, stand back up, and face their own psychological demons.

In fact, I think I have even greater respect for Sir Charles more than ever. Who hasn’t faced first tee jitters with a bunch of judging eyes looking on from the clubhouse? Sir Charles does this x millions of eyes every time he plays in a tournament. There is some type of NBA-all-star-elite-level athlete mental toughness and determination in this man.

While I don’t believe Golf Digest is truly belligerent towards Charles, I do wonder who they think their target audience are? I’m thinking your scratch golfers will not be flipping through the magazine for tips on escaping the greenside bunker. If anything, I bet the average reader is a bogey golfer or worse, looking for little tidbits that might improve their enjoyment of the game and increase participation in this “declining game”.

In the end, it generated lots of discussions- a lot of facebookers think they can easily beat Charles but they forget that Charles did this in a tournament, adhering to the strict rules of golf, and probably have cameras and onlookers waiting to see his famous swing on every stroke. That’s quite a difference between us weekend warriors and our 3 ft gimmes and first tee mulligans!

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Daly in 1997 became the first PGA Tour player to average more than 300 yards per drive over a full season. He did so again in every year from 1999 to 2008, and he was the only player to do so until 2003

– Wikipedia

Having watched his candid interview on Feherty, I think John Daly is a good, down-to-earth guy but seriously, this has got to stop. He used to be the longest hitter on PGA- do you really think it’d tickle to have his club head impact your face at that speed? One sneeze or hiccup and I’d imagine serious permanent injury or even death.

April 10, 2014 is Round 1 of the premier golf competition in the world. Yes, The Masters is about to begin. In Augusta, Georgia, the world’s best at hitting and losing their balls, walking and finding their balls, then hitting their balls and losing them again, will gather. In celebration of this most un-sporty of sports, with the possible exception of curling and rhythmic gymnastics, Ye Olde Captain Crusty has scrawled a cartoon. The original was hanging in The Louvre after the artist stuck it on the Venus de Milo to cover up her bare midriff. It’s presumably been removed. Meanwhile, while well-done fakes have purportedly been showing up on the walls of truck stop restrooms all over the American Midwest along Interstate 70.

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Say Hi to my friend, Mr. Wolfie. His only job to tame golf clubs that tends to go wild (like my wife’s Driver and 3 wood). With constant work, her big dog is now deadly accurate and hitting more fairways than the guys in our regular outings.

Mr. Wolfie’s reward is riding the golf cart and catching some breeze with us wherever we go!